Monday, June 25, 2012

Earlier I outlined women scholars' entry into the Cambridge world, now here are some memorable female scholars who made a mark on the university.

1931 students of Girton College Life Magazine

Emily Davies (1830-1921) founded Girton College, the first girls college at Cambridge. She was also a renowned suffragist and feminist.

Emily Davies

Anne Jemima Clough (1820-1892) was a suffragist and established Newnham Collage, which started out as a hostel for women traveling to attend lectures at the University.

Anne Clough

Agnata Ramsay (1867-1931) scored the
top score in the 1887 Classics Exam. She was the only scholar to score
in the highest category. In Punch Magazine a cartoon celebrating her and
supporting women's intellectual equality was featured.

Punch Magazine 1887

Philippa
Fawcett (1868-1948) made a lasting mark on female education history. On
June 7, 1890 she scored the top score on the Cambridge Math Exam. It
was the hardest test in it's subject, earlier scholars who had studied
for it had suffered from nervous breakdowns or even death after taking
the exam. The highest scoring scholar was always awarded the title of
"Senior Wrangler", because Philippa was female she was not given the
title, the second place scorer received it. Instead she was listed as
"Above the Senior Wrangler". This was the first time a woman had scored
highest in Mathematics and the last. The exam was discontinued in 1909.

Philippa Fawcett

Dorothy Annie Elizabeth Garrod (1892-1968) was the first woman to be
elected a professor at Cambridge as well as Oxford. She was a lauded
archeologist and was elected to the Disney Chair in 1939 at Newnham
Collage, Cambridge.

So I'm luck enough to be doing an academic program at Cambridge this summer. (!!!!) I live for British History, it's my absolute passion and that's what I'm studying (as well as English lit.)!! Cambridge University was founded in 1209, so academics have studied within it's walls for centuries but female academics only for a drawer's full of decades.

University of Cambridge, Cambridgeshire UK

Girton, the first Cambridge college for females, was founded in 1869. By 1881 women scholars were allowed to take their examinations but were not accepted as full on Cambridge students. In 1921 women were still not allowed to receive a full degree but in 1948 they were accepted as full members. Until 1972 women could still only attend the women's colleges but after that year they could attend any of the colleges.